Puppeteers celebrate all puppets can do as World Puppetry Day approaches

Deanna Montalvo

Updated: March 19, 2018

Calgary joins cities around the world in celebrating World Puppetry Day on Wednesday, March 21. Itís a day especially important for Wendy Passmore-Godfrey, artistic director and principle performer with WP Puppet Theatre, who submitted a request to the City of Calgary in 2016 for an official proclamation.This is one from 2016 I believe of Mayor Nenshi and Telly from Sesame Street. This was taken at a previous WP Puppet Theatre Puppet Power Conference. Courtesy WP Puppet Theatre Power Conference

While some people associate puppetry with kids’ play, in reality it’s a powerful storytelling tool that can convey tales on many different levels.

Puppetry is an art form that will be celebrated in Calgary and cities around the world as part of World Puppetry Day on Wednesday, March 21.

It’s a day especially important for Wendy Passmore-Godfrey, artistic director and founder of WP Puppet Theatre, who hopes the day will raise awareness and get people excited about the Puppet Power Conference being held here on June 1 to 3.

“I’m a puppeteer so this is my day, my art form,” she said.

The Puppet Power Conference’s theme this year is story.

It will feature international speakers from South Africa and the Philippines, amongst others, who will explain how they’ve used puppets for truth and reconciliation and to help children displaced by the typhoon in 2017, respectively.

Youtube sensation The Biggity Brothers, from Pukatawagan, Manitoba, will also make an appearance.

Passmore-Godfrey uses puppets in classrooms to teach science, mathematics and friendship, but she said it’s a storytelling medium with many layers and metaphors that can be appreciated by adults as well.

“It’s so exciting to celebrate (World Puppetry Day) and to talk to people about it and get them seeing the potential, (and) breaking them out of preconceived ideas of what puppets are.”

Puppets can be used across multiple spectrums and are often used therapeutically.

“I can say things I wouldn’t be able to say without a puppet on my arm,” said Michelle Warkentin, a career hand and rod puppeteer with 20 years of experience in the puppetry world.

Warkentin will be speaking during the Puppet Power Conference and said she hopes that World Puppetry Day will encourage people to check out the art form in June.

“It’s a celebration of puppets all over the world to share messages, to tell stories and show how magical they really are,” said Warkentin.

Warkentin’s most recent projects, Family Tear and Mii Other Woman,uses puppets as a way to speak about dementia.

“All the parts of us that are children are really there till our last breath,” said Warkentin, recounting her experience of bringing a puppet into a hospice.

Warkentin said that puppets also allow people, both as performers and audience members, to be more vulnerable and to let go.

“Puppets can ask the serious questions and be less intimidating,” she said.

World Puppetry Day was originally brought forth by Iranian puppeteer Javad Zolfaghari in 2003, and since then many cities have followed suit.

Puppets have been used on record for 2,000 years as voices of dissent, activism and social justice, and, of course, for fun.

Passmore-Godfrey will be celebrating World Puppetry Day in a classroom with elementary students, and said she hopes people will spend the day thinking of a puppet they grew up with.

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